Fierce as Frost, Sweet as Snowdrops
by mellowenglishgal
Summary: Snow jumped. The bravest thing she ever did. Her mother's strength and the skill of a gruff hunter aid her as she grows into herself, in a journey to confront the greatest evil. A rewrite of the film which delves more into Snow's mind, the Huntsman's heart, their journey together. T for now.


**A.N.**: I finally forced myself to watch _Huntsman_. And I have to say, if the script was cleaned up, the cast reduced, the lead actress recast, it would have done justice to Chris Hemsworth's manly-manliness.

So I thought I'd rewrite it as _I_ would have written the story. Firstly, get Kristen Stewart out of your head. Whoever thought she'd pass as the 'fairest' is seriously deluded—but considering her reputation with the director… I made a Pinterest board with pictures of my inspiration, and Vanessa Kirby as Estella in the 2011 BBC _Great Expectations_ just _is_ Snow White for me, the way she so closely resembles the Queen in the film.

Aside from Cesare, I _adore_ the gowns in _The Borgias_, with the high waistlines, the slashed sleeves tied to the bodice with ribbons, especially the way they wear their long hair.

That's how _I_ see the fashion of this story—far more romantic.

* * *

**Fierce as Frost, Dainty as Snowdrops**

_**01**_

Breath of Life

* * *

From what she had seen, her people were either conscripted—she remembered the word, having heard her father argue against it if he could help it, hating to take men from their homes and families at his whim, never to see them again—into the Queen's guard, given leather and impenetrable armour. Or they were maimed awfully, left to struggle in the dead fields, to prevent them ever rising up against the Ravenna's very real soldiers—or worse, the phantom ones she had conjured to lure the dead king.

And those were the men. Women—some, still girls little older than Snow White had been when first she was imprisoned in the tower—were brought frequently to the castle. They were brutalised before Snow White's very eyes, left in pain and terror—then the Queen would have them brought to her. The shock of the women was worse than their screams, and the moans of the men as they were raped.

Snow White remembered every face.

Every name.

To each she had vowed they would not be forgotten. They would be avenged.

After her mother had died, Snow White's father had brought her to the Great Chamber—an elaborate, panelled hall with a large, engraved table in the shape of a ring, where the Council met as equals. He had told Snow it was time she learned how to run the kingdom in his absence. She had believed, then, that her father would perish of his broken heart.

She would have preferred that.

For ten years she had been imprisoned, and in that time she had learned the basest cruelties men could wreak upon women. She knew now why her father and his council had condemned rapists to death by hanging.

She remembered every face, every name they screamed—their fathers, husbands, brothers—to save them. She carried their names and faces with her, her vows tucked deep in her heart, never forgotten, trying to see a way out, to avenge them.

Once upon a time, the sea-breeze had carried the scent of wildflowers from the fields; from the bleak sliver of sky she could see, very little sun appeared to nurture the earth. All she could smell now was the brine, and the decomposing bodies.

The girls were never buried. When they perished in their cells near Snow's, exhausted from lack of food, forced to work themselves to death to keep the castle in the manner Ravenna wanted it, the guards would dump the bodies into a pit just outside the base of the tower-walls. Sometimes they didn't last even that long; sometimes the Ravenna's loyal guard would slit their throats. The special ones—the ones he enjoyed breaking, the ones…who had strength, an innate beauty that went beyond their physical loveliness.

Ravenna's carrion feasted—the only creatures in the land to do so—on the remains of the girls feeding her beauty. Her _power_. Sometimes the girls had not succumbed fully when the guards emptied the cells to prepare for the next delivery of girls. They quickly fell ill, their youth and strength drained, weakened from lack of food, warmth, worked to exhaustion, and the guards would dispose of them. Sometimes she could hear the pained, pitiful whimpers of the dying on that heap.

Sometimes Snow was lucky; sometimes she was given their old clothes to replace her rags.

It was for those girls Snow White did the bravest thing she had ever done.

She jumped.

The icy water hit her like a battering ram—and shocked all the breath from her lungs. Used to the frigid tower, the water froze her to the marrow. _Keep moving_, a little voice whispered. Would she freeze to death before she could drown? The churning waves, once so calm against the coast, tossed and spun her, playing with her like a rag-doll, sucking her deep under, pulling on her drenched rags, filling her mouth, trying to drown her. The instinct to breathe overshadowed all thought, her legs starting to move of their own accord, kicking.

Kicking, kicking, exhaling saltwater, she slashed out blindly in the burning water, her lungs searing, needing breath—sound obliterated her ears as she broke through the surface, coughing, gagging, unable to catch her breath before a wave propelled her forward, dragging her under, until she hit something, _hard_.

_The rocks_! Many a shipwrecked sailor had lost their lives to that fate, so punishingly close to home, never to see it.

How, she did not know, but she found herself tossed onto the rocks—and left there, no longer tossed about by the brutal waves…but the wind cut through her sodden rags, and as she coughed and choked, weakly vomiting seawater, sputtering for breath that burned in her brine-saturated airway, wheezing and hacking, the waves crashed over her, stinging her eyes with the spray, but she no longer felt the cold…it was warm, lulling…the dizziness in her head, the burn in her eyes—from the light, from the saltwater—the wheezy, pained breaths she struggled to fill her lungs with, her frailty, her _weakness_…

The sun had blinded her when first she had freed herself. Now the light pressed against her eyelids as she struggled to breathe, so open and endless…

_Freedom_.

She had done it…she drifted off to a snowy white place full of softness and warmth, her mother's face, hazy in her memory, winking in and out like flickering sunrays, the cold lessened, the waves crashing over her gentled, until she couldn't hear them.

She did not know how long she lay on the rocks, drenched by waves, but sleep took her, and in that short time, resolve hardened, her strength, small though it was, restored. She was _free_.

Ravenna would hunt her to her death. "_Your beating heart_," her Guard had said, and the grin on his face and his cold fingertips at the neckline of her dress had made Snow shiver more than the threat. While she had been in that tower, she had grown until she did not recognise herself. She remembered being enthralled by her mother's womanly figure in her beautiful gowns…now her own breasts were heavy and high, and sometimes fit ill in the dresses tossed to her from the girls drained of their youth. They were the only bit of her body lush and soft. Would Ravenna have carved through them to get Snow's heart?

She _was_ frightened of the sorceress. At ten years old she had been locked up in the North Tower—for ten years she had been left isolated, the only voices she heard the coarse threats and curses of the guards, their unwholesome laughter as they bet in dice games, and the panicked whispers of the girls brought to their doom to feed Ravenna's vanity. Snow had not seen her father's country since the day of the wedding. She had had no lessons, no physical contact with another, no experience of the world beyond what she saw outside her cell door.

And that was no education.

As a little girl, she had been given lessons in everything from embroidery to falconry, dancing, gardening, baking, politics and languages, astronomy and music. She was born a _princess_ to one of the greatest kings of this age. It had always been expected she would be queen one day, and her training had begun early to prepare her for her position. Whatever that meant. A child, she hadn't thought anything of her duty; all she had known was that her mother was the most beautiful lady she had ever seen, and her father, the kindest and best man, who used to laugh with her in his lap while she cuddled close; they had been Mummy and Papa. Not the King and Queen of Tabor.

For all her early years of education, the expectation of the court for her future, she remembered bits and pieces of what she had learned; she had enjoyed most exploring the land…the woods, the shimmering golden fields, the little rivers, the craggy, solitary mountains so heartbreaking and misty, and she would traipse back to the castle before sundown with her hair braided with crowns of flowers by local farmers' wives, bearing the fruits of her adventuring, conkers, seashells, handfuls of flowers for her mother, a tortoise, the injured magpie she had tended to so vigilantly, unable to bear the thought of it dying, using the secret passages her father had taught her to navigate the castle unseen, playing good-natured tricks on the courtiers, whispering and sneaking sweet little pastries and fresh fruit from the kitchens…

She had not been able to reach one, on the wedding-night.

This time…a simple _sewer_ had been her salvation. She had never ventured into that passage before but she knew the layout of her father's keep better than she knew her own body. She was the rightful queen, had been raised with the expectation she would rule, and her father had indulged her sometimes mischievous, mostly adventurous spirit by teaching her everything there was to know about the keep, and the country, allowed to go about amongst her people, and go unharmed in the woods and fields.

If their lives had been half as wretched as her own, the conviction to do _something_ to claim her rightful place strengthened. A queen who had no compassion for her people's suffering…already sat on the throne that was not hers. Snow White would not, even had none of this evil occurred, been a queen who cared only for herself. It went against every fibre in her being to be selfish and unkind.

Her mother had once told her, gently pressing her manicured fingertip to Snow's temple, then her heart, "Your beauty lies here, my darling, and here. Your goodness and strength will always guide you, and because of them you will grow more radiant with each new dawn. While you remain my good, sweet girl, this land will always thrive with you to protect it. And our people will love you." She had given a sweet smile Snow could now barely remember, her pale blue eyes, almost like lilac-blossoms, shining in her fair face, and added, "Even for your naughty defiance, my sweetling."

"I only did climb the tree for you, Mummy," Snow had persisted, her eyes, so like her mother's, wide and earnest, while the physician sewed three tiny stitches into Snow's neck, just below the ear where a twig had struck her upon falling from the topmost bough of the apple-tree. She handed her mother the red apple she had plucked from the ancient apple-tree in the cloisters, her mother's favourite place in the castle. A bite had been taken out of it. "I had to make sure it was sweet enough for you, Mummy."

"Even your papa has never been to such trouble to bring me an apple," her mother had smiled, letting out a sigh of relief when the last stitch was finished, the blood washed gently from the snow-white throat of the little girl who couldn't care less about her pain, too interested with how beautiful her mother looked—and how sad.

"But Papa gives you pearls and _rubies_," Snow had said, eyes wide.

"The dwarves mine for the rubies. They must be brought up from deep under the earth, chipped away and polished. And the fishermen harvest the pearls, my darling. When they crack open the oysters, sometimes a little grain of sand was trapped within the shell—somehow, the beautiful pearl grows in the dark, radiant and perfect…and sometimes the good fishermen collect the treasures, and give your mummy a gift," her mother smiled sadly.

"Does Papa let other boys give you presents?" Snow had asked curiously.

"They give your papa his own gifts, too," the Queen had smiled. "Their hearts, their loyalty… They know their king is a great one. He helps this land thrive, and our people who live on it…and they in turn live and die for him."

"Men _die_ for Papa?"

"Sometimes, when your papa goes off to war, they lay down their lives in his protection—and the protection of our country. They protect those who remain behind. The people who live here are ours to protect, my darling. Ours to nurture, when they are vulnerable…"

"Like the magpie?" Snow asked, earnest eyes wide.

"Exactly, my little snowdrop," her mother had smiled, but it was a sad look on her face, and Snow White noticed she looked as pale as Snow's own skin. "One day you shall make a very great queen."

"Like you?" Snow asked. The lovely Queen smiled indulgently at her wide-eyed, earnest daughter, the child she had yearned for with all of her heart, and who exceeded all her greatest hopes and dreams. Even with her propensity to sneak out of the castle to collect seashells for a necklace for her Mummy, or smack her little friend William during playroom arguments that ended in tears from all involved… A strong-willed child, with colouring as dramatic as the rose she had once found blooming in the dead of snow-covered winter, and just as resilient. With a sweet sense of humour and prone to bouts of childish mischief (only encouraged by her adoring papa), she was beloved by all for her earnestness as much as the way she would raise one eyebrow when she was not impressed, her generosity and thoughtfulness—she never forgot to check on elder courtiers' ailments, and if she heard of a wedding taking place in the village she loved to explore, a small purse of gold coin would mysteriously go missing, as a gift to the newlyweds.

King Magnus teased that his daughter's goodness would bankrupt the royal coffers before any wars could.

As the physician cleaned up his apothecary boxes, sterilising the needles with hot water and flame, the Queen patted her lap, and her young daughter, so vivid the contrast between her shining hair and her face, climbed into it with a beaming smile. The Queen took up a dainty knife, cutting the apple into pieces, which they shared, the injury sustained to reach it for a gift quite forgotten by the little girl, who loved to climb trees, had learned _gymnastics_ from a travelling strongman, and would traverse the world over to pluck a blade of grass if her mother had desired it.

She started violently, when something snorted and nuzzled her back, so consumed by the dreamed memory of her mother, she was loathe to be brought crashing back to consciousness. The light blinded her as her entire body tensed, muscle trapping over her bones, no flesh to cushion falls or warm her, her lungs seizing with the crispness and fullness of the fresh air, and turned to her back, wheezing softly as she gazed up. A horse. A jolt shook her, fear gripping her insides like ice, and her eyes darted, the sun suddenly forgotten as her eyes took in every detail. A horse _without_ a rider.

Relief swept over her, but when she tried to move, to stand, climb on its back, her body screamed in protest, and she gave a choked moan of pain, panting several breaths before trying again; she managed to roll to her side. The ache in her lungs, the dizziness in her head had lessened, but her body was battered from the waves, from the icy rock…and she was thin. So very thin. Her body was frail, even as her soul had strengthened over the years, with the conviction to avenge those she had had no strength to save.

The horse, a beautiful roan with intelligent eyes, snorted softly, restless on its feet, before it bent its knees, coming flush to the ground, so close Snow could feel its heat radiating from its sleek body. She smiled dazedly, reaching out her hand, and the horse snorted as she brushed its mane, before threading her fingers through the long, shining hair. Slowly, she pulled herself to the horse's side, just managing to hook her leg over its back, and adjust herself not to fall, when the horse stood, lifting her as if she weighed nothing…

She held on tight, and the horse carefully picked its way through the rocky shoreline. It had been many long years since she had ridden a horse—always side-saddle, never without a bridle or reins. Never without a _saddle_. The movement jostled Snow, made the aches in her frail, battered body protest, but she stifled her whimpers, and as the horse hastened into a trot, she held on, and lifted her head.

The great aching chasm inside her chest ruptured anew as the horse bore her through what had once been exquisite meadows and woodlands packed to bursting with life, the sounds of birds chirping, the scent of wildflowers, sun-baked moss, honey, sweet fruit, the scent of brine and the colourful fishing-boats out on the water, bringing their catch to the market, the rich, sweet scent of slow-braised meat, children laughing in farmhouse flower-gardens, markets busy with chatter, babies gurgling on their mother's hips while their fathers chuckled and play-fought with their sons, the smithies busy and ringing like the bells, the granaries constantly busy producing flour for the famous Tabor love-affair with fresh bread and pasta of every shape. There had been such colour, vitality, faces crinkled with laughter, warmed with tans from the summer sunshine. The thought of the spring sustained them all throughout the snowy winters, taking pleasure from little delights, sweet chestnut crème spread on hot crêpes, fresh apple pies and blackberry-picking, waiting for the first sign of snowdrops among the snow to signal the coming of spring, the first of the spring lamb, the carpets of bluebells. She could remember the stickiness of fragrant hot-cross buns at the spring festivals, the first of the summer strawberries and cream.

Once upon a time, the beautiful Queen had called her beloved daughter her "little snowdrop". She had taught Snow White the name of every flower, taught her to draw and embroider them beautifully, the castle alive with colour even in winter from her nimble-fingered, delicate work. Snow White had always favoured daffodils. A burst of sunshine on the cusp of winter, just touching into spring, a spark of tangible _hope_. She remembered when the sky used to be forget-me-not blue, the ground carpeted with green as far as the eye could see.

Now Tabor was…desolated. Everything was bleak, the colour of mist and mud, a persistent drizzle dampening all warmth, and with it…hope. There was nothing _green_. Nothing grew. Her heart broke anew to see the countryside, once so famed for its natural beauty, reduced to petrified trees, deep puddles of mud and decomposing bodies—animal and human, for the crossroads nearest the castle bore evidence of the Queen's malice, bodies strung up in cages, nailed to crosses, left as a warning no one needed to be literate to understand. Some of the corpses were small…young children strung up to defeat their parents' spirits…

Snow White had heard rumours of the fate of her country under Ravenna's rule. Each girl brought to the castle lived long enough for Snow White to interact with them, to learn of the goings-on in her kingdom from whichever devastated village they had been abducted. She had heard of Ravenna's cruelty, her malice, her destructive power. Beauty, life, hope; she consumed all, to the ruin of everything around her, feeding off the disruption of nature.

The girls told Snow White that nature had turned on itself, Ravenna's reign so poisonous—nature had turned on itself, and the bedraggled, ruined people turned on each other, destitute and hopeless.

Every girl brought to the castle was shocked to discover Snow White was the king's daughter. Across the country, rumours persisted that all within the castle had been slain the night of the King's murder.

_All_…but one.

She had seen the first of the soldiers' culling of her people, been dragged away from the courtyard by Ravenna's loyal guard even while the screams and the sickening sound of metal scraping against bone had echoed in the still winter's night. Snow White alone had been spared, for no purpose any then had foreseen, to dwell for ten years within the icy stone walls of the bitterest cell in the North Tower—a place her father had always deemed too cold, too inhumane, to keep prisoners in.

No one ever knew Snow White was still alive: the girls who learned of her never left the castle walls alive to spread the word. She could remember the shock, the grief and _hope_ that flared in their eyes when they heard her name.

Some were too young to remember Tabor as anything other than what Ravenna had made it; but somehow they all knew of Snow White, the great king's beloved only daughter.

She wondered what would have happened if her father's loyal men had learned she lived still. They had been good men, strong and loyal, wise. She had loved them, remembered their tired, battle-worn faces light up with warm, sad smiles when they saw her. Especially as her mother's strength waned. Duke of Hammond most of all. Would they try to reclaim the castle and free her? Concert their efforts to placing Snow White on her rightful throne, rather than protecting her people.

The girls had sometimes told Snow White they had been searching for the Duke of Hammond. From the guards, she knew the Duke's castle in the highlands had been abandoned, they guessed that the Duke had taken as many refugees as he could protect and hidden somewhere, safe—even from Ravenna's dark magic. There were few places in this world where her magic was rendered impotent. How the Duke had managed to find one of those places, and how her people now found _him_, Snow could not fathom. How _she_ was to find him, she did not know. The last girl to come to the castle had been captured on her way to seek the Duke. All the girls from her village had been taken. To feed Ravenna's power…and to sate her soldiers.

But the Duke protected any refugee brave enough to flee Ravenna, and for that Snow would be eternally grateful to him, her father's oldest, wisest friend and general.

Snow saw that the girls were right. Ravenna's soldiers had pillaged the land, destroying village after village, leaving the land infertile in their wake…

The market-town she had once so adored, closest to the castle, where her father used to take her to treat her to a ribbon or a bun from the colourful stalls as children giggled and played, enthralled by the tall, handsome king laughing with his little girl, where she had played with the local children spinning around the maypole, playing hopscotch, on the king's birthday, Snow had been gifted with a skipping-rope with engraved, painted handles from the entire town…it was unrecognisable. More cages were strung up in the party tree—the great chestnut where ribbons and lanterns were strung during every holiday, under which banquets were spread for the townspeople, where Snow had snuck out to watch pretty young girls in their finest, crowned with flowers, wed their beloveds in the spring sun. Now cages hung from that beautiful chestnut, which had given life to even the most destitute in the form of its nuts, free for all to pick, favourite haunt for boys to climb, and Snow herself. Now a wide berth was given to that bare tree, the cages squeaking slightly as the wind rocked them, rain pattering off everything metallic, drenching the thatched roofing on some of the cottages. The windows, those not shattered, were opaque with grime, the main street slick with puddles of mud, the troughs for the horses as dirty as the ground, and the people…_her_ people…

Emaciated, dirty, haggard, some of them even had bits missing. Where once bells had rung out to celebrate a new union, there was now no mirth, only a grim desire to simply continue on living. The smithy was silent, the inns shut up, and she saw not one child amongst the haggard townspeople who picked up whatever weapons they had to hand… Menace and fear mingled in their determined expressions, and she felt sure had she been one of Ravenna's soldiers, their doors would be bolted shut tight, not daring to breathe.

Had they known who she was, Snow wondered whether they would take their arms up against Ravenna's soldiers. And in their pitiful state, she would never send them to their deaths for as gruesome an execution as those in the cages. She glanced over her shoulder, struggling for breath as her lungs struggled to take in the clear, cold air so unfamiliar to them. The sound of cavalry was one familiar to her, Ravenna's soldiers coming to and fro from the castle on horseback, bringing wagons full of kidnapped girls, and on the wind she thought she could hear the muted thunder of horses' hooves on the mud-slick ground.

"Ravenna's men make chase," she said, glancing around, hoping they heeded her words, "all of you inside. Give them no cause to injure you further." Tears burned her eyes at the sight of the skeletal children lingering around the old schoolhouse, their faces haggard and joyless. She patted the horse's neck, whispering, "Go." The furious desperation of the townspeople set her teeth on edge, scaring her as Ravenna's soldiers never had with their impenetrable armour and sharp swords.

The horse picked up an even canter, racing away from the seaside town, once so vibrant and alive, now the houses boarded up or razed to the ground, whipping through sloppy flats full of tree-stumps and carcases, where once fields of wheat had shimmered and soughed in the briny breeze, pretty farmhouses boasting gardens overflowing with flowers and giggling children with ribbons in their hair. The horse flew over the sloppy earth, kicking up mess, and all around her, everything was parched, devastated, petrified…dead.

How long she rode, Snow did not know, for the landscape had changed dramatically since her imprisonment, no familiar markers to gauge her progress by, only deadened flats, gentle slopes knifed with dagger-like tree-trunks torn and ripped by Ravenna's wickedness as it poisoned the earth. The woods she had once adored traipsing through were as devastated as the rest of the countryside, no longer chirping with songbirds, fragrant with baking moss and dewy violets, pollen perfuming the air as animals skittered about in the underbrush, doe and their little white-tailed fawns twitching their ears, trees bearing sweet fruits dropped to the underbrush for animals to forage, or left to sweetly rot into the earth. Everything was the colour of the sewer that had borne her to freedom, petrified trees spearing the soupy earth, or else chopped down, jagged stumps rotting in deep puddles.

As they flew over the soupy terrain, Snow became aware of the sound of thunder. The sky above was stormy, churning, vibrant ice-grey giving way to iron and ink as if some greater power had taken a paintbrush and painted the clouds, and the drizzle kept up, miserable and unrelenting, but there was no lightning to accompany the thunder. No, the sound of thunder came not from the sky, but from the very earth. It was the sound she had feared would chase after her; Ravenna's armoured cavalry.

"Make haste," she whispered frantically to the horse, patting its neck, and somehow the horse picked up more speed, flying past trees—an errant twig smacked her in the face as they whipped past, tearing her cheek, and she gasped, her fingers tight on the horse's mane the only reason she did not lurch backwards off her mount, breaking her neck.

If the soldiers found her, they would take her back to the once-beautiful castle Ravenna had overturned. Would they ravage her to break her spirit, as they had the girls brought to sustain Ravenna's power? Wiping the blood from her cheek with the back of her hand, she stifled a choked sob and blinked burning tears from her eyes. Ravenna's loyal guard had told Snow the witch desired her "beating heart"—was she no good to the usurper-queen dead? And why now, why, after ten long and bitter years, was Snow White finally of use to the dark sorceress?

The guard had told her that today was the day Snow White had come of age.

Did that mean her birthday?

A pang stole through her chest, battered though the insides were after so long in that tower, seeing the state of this country. Her twenty-first birthday.

More tears burned, scalding her icy cheeks, stinging as the seawater had, the warmth unfamiliar, quickly cooled and dashed away by the drizzle and the cold wind.

Ten bitter years had passed since her father's murder. And she had not cried. Now, on the day her mother had brought her into the world, she had found her courage to do what she should have done on her father's wedding-night—take a blade and run it through her foe.

For one brief moment, Snow White had looked to her new stepmother for strength, answers—only to see betrayal resonating from every icy cell in her perfect angel's face. Over ten years, the sorceress had come to watch Snow White, hidden in shadows, but Snow had seen her. As flawless as an ice-sculpture, her blue eyes radiated nothing but malice and cold calculation—like the white queen on a chessboard. She had gone unchanged, chillingly flawless, perfectly formed and dressed richly, and every time she came to the North Tower, dressed in furs against the cold, she would regard Snow White with reluctant curiosity. As if she couldn't quite fathom what Snow White was.

_Twenty-one_, Snow thought, with a desolated gasp. She was twenty-one years old—she was now of-age. Her mother had wed King Magnus on her twenty-first birthday, the fairest lady in all of Tabor. Snow White remembered gazing at the bridal-gown her mother had kept safe, entranced by the exquisite details, filled with joy and excitement, that her mother had kept it, that her own daughter might wear it on her wedding-day, but she couldn't…couldn't remember what the gown had looked like… The dream while she had been unconscious on the rocks was the first time in years Snow White had remembered the sound of her mother's voice, the brush of soft velvet as she climbed into her warm lap, the frailty in her thin white fingers as she had cut up the apple, the softness of her warm lips as Snow White had leaned up to kiss them, tasting the apple she had plucked for her mother.

She had not realised then that her mother had already been dying.

Her mother had been wed on her twenty-first birthday, the single most joyful day in her life _except_ for the birth of her only daughter. The anniversary for both landed on the _same_ _day_. Snow White's birthday, her mother's. Eleven years had passed since Snow White's mother had died. And her memories of the beautiful lady were dwindling with every passing day.

For whatever unholy purpose the sorceress desired it, she would never have Snow White's beating heart to rip from her chest, still warm with blood. Every fibre in Snow White's being knew if Ravenna _did_ take hold of her heart in her hands, everything, all hope, was lost. Irrevocably. For ten years she had been entombed in the darkest, coldest place in the unrecognisable castle, for no reason anyone could fathom. Not even Ravenna had known at the time why she kept the little princess alive. Perhaps it had been the way her back had been held straight, her shoulders thrown back and her chin raised defiantly, glaring with the grief of every lost soul as her father's courtiers were butchered, defenceless. Perhaps because Ravenna, too, had lost her own mother at nearly the same age, and they were both considered _the fairest_ in the world.

The _fairest_…

Rumours of the queen's vanity persisted. Whispers said that she stood before a mirror, chanting, "_Mirror, Mirror, on the wall, who is fairest…of them all_?" And each time, the mirror would answer her name. To need such constant assurance of her beauty? The sorceress's flawless perfection had only ever been skin-deep, and Snow White knew the girls brought to the castle fed her vanity, her power, and kept up the charade of her external beauty. Inside, Snow White thought Ravenna was cold and soulless the ice her pale eyes resembled.

Why? On this day, the day Snow White had come of age, why did Ravenna desire her death _now_? What could she gain by taking Snow White's heart from her chest? Only evil purpose, she was sure…

Snow White resolved in that moment, her eyes stinging with tears, that the sorceress would _never_ have her heart.

If she had to plunge a knife into her own heart to render whatever power it possessed useless to the queen…she would.

Something told Snow the fate of her country rested on the fate of her heart, and to withhold it from the queen meant the queen's defeat—but to help her people, and this dead country, how could she make sure the queen literally never got her hands on her heart, when the only way Snow could see to defeat her was to take her own life, to make sure the queen never could.

But how could she ruin her heart for the queen while keeping it intact to serve her people?

The horse carried her on, cantering as fast as he could to bear her, the woods she might once have remembered when the world had been beautiful, and beyond—until fog swirled either side of them like pyres and towers, an intangible labyrinth of false images, what little light there had been muted, devoured by the fog, making the fine hairs on the back of her neck and her arms raise, a shiver passing through her. It was unnatural. The horse whinnied in alarm, as disconcerted as Snow White herself, hearing the soft soughs of the wind muted by the fog, as if voices whispered to them from within the swirling mists…

Shadows and mist seeped around them, the landscape outlined with patches of underbrush, and as they whipped past Snow White was certain the mist rose _from_ the patches of shimmering dark water, almost like oil, and beyond…suddenly, she could see a wall. Not of stone, but of primordial trees, gnarled and twisted with age, bare, and instilling her with a deep sense of fear and dread. The horse suddenly whinnied loudly—the sound carried eerily on the mist, as the horse reared up, and Snow White yelled out, holding on for dear life, and reached out to pat the horse's neck as it pranced nervously, flicking its tail, whinnying and tossing its head, its eyes wild.

"Shh," she whispered, stroking its shining neck, steaming with exertion, slick with sweat, and the horse slowed its pace, still whinnying softly in fright, perhaps gentled by her touch, but a bird's cry piercing through the fog startled it, rearing up again in its panic; Snow held on, but the bird had frightened her, too, sending a thrill of fear gripping through her bones like ice.

She had heard of this place. The Dark forest. Her father used to terrify her with stories of this nightmarish place—mushrooms that released pollen, causing hallucinations; things lurking in the water; trolls and spectres meant to lure unwary travellers to their deaths… He had told her this was the place the desperate went when they wanted to die, too strong to be killed anywhere else. As a child, stories of this place, told by her father at the fireside, had caused nightmares that led to her climbing into bed to sleep between her parents for a fortnight. Their hot, bare skin either side of her had been the best and most natural comfort and protection, both gently embracing her even in sleep. When her mother went away, her favourite lady-in-waiting, a beautiful healer named Anna, had taken her mother's place, climbing into Snow White's bed to comfort her and cuddle her, her father too preoccupied with his grief.

Now the Dark forest stretched beyond sight, and the thrill of her nightmares gripped her with terror—but there was no way around, certainly no way back, and she had not escaped the Queen's guard and an undefeatable army in an impenetrable castle to be defeated by the first obstacle.

The bird that had scared her and the horse cried out again, and this time, her hand stroking the horse's neck, it stepped forward hesitantly, snorting in its fright, to the edges of a bog, and Snow White could see…a magpie. No—_two_. Possibly the very two that had shown her the nail—and the sewer-entrance in the courtyard…

Her old friends… The birds trilled, and as she watched, they circled lower, to moss-covered stepping-stones hazy in the mists, dotted amongst murky ponds covered with a scum of dead insects, iridescent beetles, even little birds, mice and voles, clumps of deadened reeds and bracken surrounding each reeking puddle. The horse reared, whinnying in fear, its hooves clopping against the ground as it tossed its head and snorted, backing away, but Snow White thought she could hear the sound of thunder growing, and that sound filled her with more dread than the prospect of the Dark forest.

"Shh, shh, it's alright," she murmured, stroking the horse's neck. "Calm, be still… I will not force you there." She stroked the horse's neck, until it snorted, gentled, still shaking. Snow White could feel its massive, powerful body trembling. It did nothing to dispel her trepidation, but between a tiny sliver of hope and certain death, she would take the Dark forest and all its evil. For the Queen was surely worse.

Carefully, and with her entire body screaming—especially her thighs and her hips, unused to riding, or physical exertion of any kind, her body was being battered worse than in ten years of isolation and neglect—she swung her leg over the horse's back, slowly lowering herself, her legs deadened from riding so long, and stumbled onto the slick ground. She threw out her hands to balance, just preventing herself from falling face-first into the soupy mud, her legs screaming, trembling with disuse and exhaustion, and panted, biting back a cry at the pain. The horse remained where it was, gentled now, realising she intended not to drag it by the mane into the unholy forest but risk its dangers herself, and she pressed her palm gently against its side, using its sturdiness as a support, testing her weight on her legs, until she was beside its great, beautiful head, black eyes so solemn and intelligent shining back at her through great fans of lashes.

She paused, hearing the thunder of hooves grow a tiny bit louder, and her heart stuttered as she glanced over her shoulder. She could see nothing in the fog, but the mist distorted sound and the way it travelled, and the horsemen could be ten miles away or twenty feet, she would not know the difference until it was too late.

She glanced around, several small rocks catching her eye and she carefully bent to retrieve a handful. Once upon a time, she had taken her playmates unawares striking them on the forehead with a conker. They would do much against the armoured helmets of the queen's soldiers, but if she came across more bogs, she needed to know where solid footing was to be found.

Her memories of her parents were fading with every year, but there were things she remembered from playing with William and pretty Iain—not just chasing after them with mistletoe, giggling deliciously, but having adventures in the woods, learning which kinds of berries naturally healed and disinfected a wound…although Papa had taught her first, and she had impressed the boys with her knowledge of soldiers' healing. The berries, the conkers, she remembered the little bits and pieces her father had taught her about hunting, things the boys had taught her about tracking deer and covering her _own_ tracks, and laughing with William and Sir Thomas' son Iain as they clambered up trees like squirrels, Snow delighting in beating them to the topmost bough, smug that she alone was slight enough to perch on the uppermost branches while the boys rolled their eyes and grinned at her adventurous, boyish spirit, determined to defy them when they said she could not do this or that.

The way the magpies fluttered onto stepping-stones, hopping over each other, reminded her of the way she, William and Iain had played leapfrog, giggling, their palms stained from picking blackberries, as were their lips, the boys bearing evidence on their cheeks of losing kiss-chase to light-footed Snow. Her stomach ached, gazing unseeingly at the stepping-stones, the magpies, wondering, not for the first time, what fate had befallen her childhood friends.

The Duke of Hammond's wise, saddened face appeared in her mind, and her resolve sharpened, her physical pains forgotten with the desire to set one foot before the other and follow the path the magpies showed her was safe. The horse stamped, and she reached to gently rub her knuckles softly down its nose.

"Thank you," she whispered, and the horse flicked its eyes at her, snorted softly, and started tramping around as she eyed the edge of the bog, licking her lips, and took a deep breath. The coldness of the air, the fullness of it in her lungs, gave her strength, and she reached down briefly to gather up the hems of her skirts, tucking them up to the side of the thick leather belt buckled around her skinny waist, out of the way of her feet, not a vulnerability something could grab onto, dragging her into the dead water.

As soon as she stepped on them, the mossy stepping-stones gave way under even her insubstantial weight, and she had to hop, all too soon the magpies taking flight with cries, and as the sound of hooves echoed on the strange air, the horse snorted behind her, whinnying in a panic, and she stepped hastily, eyes peeled, her nerves on edge, searching for the next mossy stone, the soles of her boots slipping and sliding on the gristly mud and moss coating the slimy stones, her knees threatening to buckle every time she wobbled, but she picked her way through the bog, and gazed up in mingled terror and awe at the primordial trees oozing strange mists and a phosphorescent, unwholesome glow at their roots, until the bog gave way to deadened earth, thorny bracken, petrified trees glittering with strange, luminous eyes she became instantly wary of.

A neigh and the snorting of horses made a thrill shiver through her tired body, and glancing over her shoulder, she was sure the fog had darkened a way off, in the direction she had come. The horse, snorting, glanced around, flicking its long tail, and neighed loudly, then bolted. The magpies cawed, seeing her safely to the edge of the bog, but they were too afraid of the trees to follow Snow White into the eerie stillness of an evil forest.

* * *

**A.N.**: Having watched the film over and over since I first started writing this first chapter, I've come to realise that it is actually the Huntsman whose heart is the strongest and truest in the entire film. Perhaps it's a testament to Chris Hemsworth's acting, but the Huntsman's emotional journey is actually the most captivating storyline in the film.

Oh—this story was somewhat inspired by the song 'If I Lose Myself' by _OneRepublic_. And of course, _Florence + The Machine_'s wonderful 'Breath of Life'.


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